Part 1 (1/2)
Nan Sherwood at Lakeview Hall.
by Annie Roe Carr.
CHAPTER I
THE BRAND NEW BAG
There would have been no trouble at all, Nan was sure, had it not been for that new bag.
In the first place it was a present from her Aunt Kate Sherwood, although Nan purchased it herself. The purchasing of most of her school outfit was supervised by Mrs. Harley, at the same time that her own daughter's was bought, but a few last purchases were left to the girls and Nan and Bess certainly had a most delightful time shopping in Chicago for a week, before they started for Lakeview Hall.
Of course, Bess' mother was right at hand to advise and guide; otherwise careless Bess would have bought with prodigal hand, and cautious Nan's outfit would not have been as well selected as the girl's absent mother would have desired.
But n.o.body interfered with the matter of the brand new bag. Nan and her chum went to one of the smartest leather-goods shops and selected the s.h.i.+ny, russet-leather beauty without any adult interference save that of an obliging clerk. Mrs. Henry Sherwood had saved the money herself and insisted upon Nan's taking it and purchasing ”just the handsomest traveling bag the money would buy.”
”You know, honey-bird,” the good woman said to her niece, the evening before Nan left Pine Camp--which was away up in the Peninsula of Michigan. ”You know, honey-bird, money's been scarce with your Uncle Hen and me for some time back; but now that the trouble about the Perkins Tract is settled, and he can go to lumbering again, we'll be all right.
”I honestly do believe, Nan, that if you hadn't made such a friend of Toby Vanderwiller and of his wife and his crippled grandson, and if you and your Cousin Tom hadn't helped Tobe out of the swamp when he got mired in the big storm, that maybe the trouble about the boundary line between your uncle's timber option and Gedney Raffer's tract, wouldn't have been settled, in court or out, for a year or two.
”That being the case,” Mrs. Sherwood pursued, ”your Uncle Henry and I, and Tom and Rafe, would have been mighty poor for a long time to come.
Now the prospect's bright before us, child, and I want you should take this I've saved from my egg and berry money, and buy you just the handsomest traveling bag you can get for it.
”I've seen 'em all pictured out in the mail-order catalogue--full of brushes, and combs, and cut-gla.s.s bottles to hold sweet scent, and tooth-powder, and all sorts of didos. That's the kind I want you to have.”
”Oh! but Aunt Kate!” Nan Sherwood said doubtfully, ”this is a great deal of money to spend for a hand bag.”
”I wish 'twas twice as much!” declared the lumberman's wife, vigorously.
”Twice as much?” Nan gasped.
”Yes. Then the things could be gold trimmed instead of only silver. I want you to have the very nicest bag of any girl going to that big school.”
The awe-struck Nan and the delighted Elizabeth were quite sure that the woman from the Michigan Peninsula had her wish when they walked out of the leather-goods shop, the handsome russet bag firmly clutched by its possessor.
The bag was packed at once, for its purchase was almost the last bit of shopping there was to do before the chums from Tillbury left Chicago.
Mrs. Harley rose early in the morning to go with them to the train. She declared that afterward she intended going back to the hotel to ”sleep for a week.”
”I'd rather superintend the general fall cleaning at home than get you two girls ready to go to boarding school again,” she sighed.
”I'm sure you've been awfully good to me, Mrs. Harley,” said Nan. ”My own dear Momsey Sherwood could have treated me no more kindly. And, of course, she couldn't have shopped for me so well, for she has been too much of an invalid for a long while to take any interest in the shops.”
Mrs. Harley kissed her heartily. ”You blessed child!” she declared.
”_You're_ no trouble to suit. Bess is the finicky person.” Her daughter began to pout. ”Oh, you are, Miss!” and her mother held up an admonitory finger and shook it at Bess. ”Next time I shall buy what I think is proper and leave you at home while I am buying. Why! these children nowadays are more fussy about their frocks, and more insistent upon the style of them, than their mothers. What I shall do, Elizabeth, when your little sisters are old enough to go away to school, I--do--not--see!”
”Oh, by that time,” said Bess, the modern, ”I shall be 'out,' I hope, and may have really something to say about my own clothes.”
”Hear her!” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mrs. Harley. ”It will be several years yet, young lady, before you will be 'out,' as you call it, or be allowed to spend your father's money as lavishly as you would like to.”